1. Field of the Invention
The present invention provides an automatic medication dispensing device wherein an alarm notifies a user that the desired dosage is accessible and ready for use.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Pill dispensing mechanisms have been commercially available for many years. Typically, the dispensing mechanism comprises a box having dosage compartments and indicia indicating what dosage should be taken on a particular day. However, the user is still dependent on his/her memory to open the correct compartment, at the appropriate dosage time periods. This problem becomes aggravated when the recipient of the medicine is elderly or infirmed, has difficulty in remembering what medicine to take and at what time and is not eligible or financially capable of having health providers available to ensure that the proper dosage is ingested.
The conventional prior art device described hereinabove is designed to allow the user to have access to the compartments at all times, both to take the medicine and to reload the compartments. This accessibility feature has a disadvantage in that the user inadvertently could remove medicine from the wrong compartment and/or reload a compartment with the wrong medicine.
Exemplary teachings of devices that dispense medication at predetermined schedules are set out in the following patents:
1. U.S. Pat. No. 3,722,739 to Blumberg discloses a circular pill dispenser having pockets for pills formed on an annular ring, two annular members overlying the pill ring which have windows which register to expose any one pocket. A timing device prevents registering of another pocket until expiration of a pre-set time interval. The device has an audible warning device to tell a user medicine is due to be taken. PA1 2. U.S. Pat. No. 5,323,929 to Marlar discloses a manually operated medicine dispenser having a programmable timer with a audible/visual alarm for indicating when a patient is to take medicine. PA1 3. U.S. Pat. No. 3,369,697 to Glucksman et al discloses a timed medication dispenser for dispensing medication at pre-selected time intervals and includes sensing means responsive to the passage of a dose to a delivery station to deactivate a timer and reactivate the timer when the dose is removed from the delivery station. PA1 4. U.S. Pat. No. 3,651,984 to Redenback discloses a birth control pill dispensing apparatus having an alarm mechanism to alert the user to take the prescribed medication. PA1 5. U.S. Pat. No. 4,911,327 to Shepherd et al discloses a pill dispenser including means for releasing pills at predetermined intervals. PA1 6. U.S. Pat. No. 5,044,516 to Hoar provides a medication dispensing assembly allowing a dispensing regimen of up to eight medication increments in a 24 hour day. PA1 7. U.S. Pat. No. 5,152,422 to Springer discloses a device for dispensing predetermined pills in sequential order and includes a plurality of magazine sections for holding a plurality of vertically stacked pill containers in stacked arrays, pills being dispensed through a housing dispensing opening.
The above noted devices, although providing means for enabling a patient to take medication in a predetermined sequence, tend to be complex and expensive. In addition, a mechanism for preventing a patient from having access to the device and taking more medication than prescribed while allowing easy loading of the device is not disclosed. Further, the health provider does not have a way of determining if a dose was taken and when, thus defeating compliance regimens demanded by managed care and insurance organizations. Specifically, these groups are anxious to prevent a patient from becoming medically more dependent by not taking the proper dosage of medicine and thus reduce the attendant costs; health insurance groups likely would reduce the insurance payback to the patient if it was determined that the patient was not taking the proper medication.
What would be desired is to provide an automatic dosage dispenser device where the user is alerted a number of times daily, via an audible alarm, that a proper dosage is available for ingestion and wherein the dosage storage compartments are inaccessible to the patient but accessible to the health provider, thus effectively providing a way to ensure that the patient is in compliance with the prescribed dosage regimen.